The Detective Omnibus: "City of Gold and Shadows", "Flight of a Witch" and "Funeral of Figaro"

CHAPTER FIVE

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They were too numbed by then, and too tired, to do much exclaiming, however their orderly minds rebelled at believing in mayhem and murder at Aurae Phiala. They stared in fascination at the imperfect outline which did indeed look more and more like the print of a shoe the longer they gazed. Lawrence said hesitantly, with almost exaggerated care to sound reasonable and calm: ‘But why? Why should anyone want to… to kill him?’ It took quite a lot of resolution to utter it at all. ‘Just a visitor here like anyone else. There couldn’t be any personal reason.’

‘I think,’ said Lesley sensibly, ‘I’ll make some coffee. We could all do with some.’ And she walked out of the room with something of the same wary insistence on normality. It was then still some twenty minutes short of midnight, though they seemed to have devoured the greater part of the night already in this improbable interview.

‘Someone,’ said Gus, ‘didn’t want me around, that’s certain. But wasn’t he still taking rather a chance, if it was all that important to him that I shouldn’t survive? I might have revived enough to struggle out, once he was gone.’

‘So you might,’ George agreed. ‘With a river handy, and you past resistance, why not do the obvious thing, and shove you far enough in to make sure the current took you? Even a swimmer with all his wits about him might well be in trouble down those reaches at this time of year. Out cold, you wouldn’t have a dog’s chance.’

‘You comfort me,’ said Gus grimly, ‘you really do. Go on, tell me, why didn’t he?’

‘Pretty obviously that’s what he intended. He simply didn’t have time.’

‘Because he heard me coming,’ said Charlotte.

‘I think so. He needed no more than one extra minute, or two, but he didn’t have it. He heard you, and he preferred to run for it. He dropped Mr Hambro where he was, in the edge of the water, and planted a foot between his shoulders to drive him in deeper before he made off.’

‘But without reason!’ protested Paviour. ‘Surely no one but a madman…’

‘The procedure would appear to be far from mad—quite coldly methodical. And since, as Mr Lawrence says, there could hardly be anything personal in the attack, we’re left with the probability that anyone who had happened along at that moment would have been dealt with in the same way. You were suspected, in fact, of having blundered head-on into something no one was supposed to see.’

‘I didn’t see a thing,’ Gus said bitterly. ‘Not a thing! He needn’t have bothered scragging me, if that was his trouble.’

‘He could hardly ask you, and take your word for it, could he? Obviously he thought you’d witnessed something you shouldn’t have. At best he was afraid you might have, and that was enough. But Miss Rossignol was some way behind, and advancing without stealth.’ He cast one brief glance at Charlotte, caught her large, clear, self-possessed eye, and one conspiratorial spark of laughter passed between them. He knew she had been exercising what stealth she was capable of, and he knew why, but that was purely between the two of them. ‘There was no need to think she’d noticed anything, and whoever he was, he wasn’t mad enough to go looking for extra murders. He took a chance—admittedly an almost negligible one—on you, and slipped away to avoid her.’

Lesley brought in a laden tray, set it down on a side-table, and distributed cups in silence.

‘In view of the apparent urgency of getting rid of you,’ said George Felse, stirring his coffee, ‘it might be an idea if you tried to recall what, if anything, you did see.’

Gus held his head, and pondered. ‘Well, of course there’s always some reflected light, once your eyes get used to being out at night. But I didn’t meet anyone, I didn’t hear anyone. Oh, yes, after I got to the perimeter of Aurae Phiala, where you can see clean across the bowl to the road the other side, I did see cars pass there a couple of times. You get a sort of lighthouse flash from the headlights, as they swing round the curve there and out of sight. The lights cross the bowl gradually, and out again, and then the dip in the road cuts them off. Yes, and the second time that happened it swept across the standing walls there, and in the near end of the caldarium there was somebody standing by the wall. No, not moving, quite still. It was only a glimpse. The light swerves off in an instant, and it’s darker than ever. But he was there, all right.’

‘He?’ said George.

‘Oh, yes, it was a he. The whole cut of him,’ he said, imprecisely but comprehensively. ‘No doubt about it.’

‘But nothing more detailed? Clothing? Build?’

‘Oh, for God’s sake!’ said Gus irritably. ‘One flash of light, and gone. Just a mass, like a Henry Moore figure. He didn’t have any clothing, just a shape. All I know is, it was a he, and he was there.’

‘And how long was this before you were attacked?’

‘I’d say about three full minutes, maybe even four, before I was hit. I didn’t think anything of it. He had as much right to be out walking as I had.’

‘Not in Aurae Phiala,’ said Stephen Paviour, in tones of quiet outrage. ‘Not at that hour. Our gates are closed at six—seven in summer. He had no right inside the enclave, whoever he was.’

‘No, true enough. But the path along the river is a right of way, and there’s only a token wire in between. Anyone could walk up into the enclosure. You’d have a job to stop them.’

‘You know,’ said Lesley, busy at the coffee-tray, ‘I must have been out there about the same time. Oh, no, I wasn’t down by the river, I was over on the side next to the road. I often have a little walk along the new plantation there. That’s what cuts off the headlights, you see. The site is very exposed on that side, in Roman times there was a woodland there, so it was sheltered. Now we’re trying to replace it, to reproduce the same conditions. I was home well before ten, though. I never noticed the exact time, but I was in the bath when I heard the stir down here.’

‘You didn’t see anything of this man in the caldarium?’ George asked.

‘No, I didn’t. Though I must have been around just at that time, I think. I do remember seeing two—maybe three—cars pass on the Silcaster road, but I didn’t notice anything shown up in their headlights.’ She hesitated for a moment, poised vulnerably with the coffee-pot in one hand, and the jug of hot milk in the other. ‘You know… please don’t think I’m being funny!—maybe Mr Hambro saw the Aurae Phiala ghost. And don’t think I’m crazy, either,’ she appealed warmly. ‘Look, it’s only half a joke. You go and ask in the village. People have seen things! You don’t have to take my word for it, they’ll talk about it quite freely, they’re not ashamed or afraid of it.’

‘My dear, this is frivolous,’ her husband said with frowning disapproval. ‘Mere local superstition. We’re concerned with realities, unfortunately.’

‘Are there such stories?’ George asked mildly.

‘Can you imagine such a place as Aurae Phiala existing without giving rise to its own legends? I have heard loose talk of people seeing things here by night, but I’ve never paid the least attention, so I can’t tell you what they claim.’

‘I’m not being frivolous,’ Lesley declared firmly, ‘and these are realities. I don’t mean helmeted sentries literally do patrol the walls by night, I don’t mean even that anything’s actually been seen, but the things that go on in people’s minds are realities, and do influence events. It hardly matters whether there’s a ghost there to be seen or not—what matters is whether someone is convinced he saw it. Besides, what’s a ghost, anyhow? I’m not a convinced believer, I just don’t find it difficult to credit that in these very ancient sites of occupation, where such emotional things are known to have happened, people should develop special sensitivities, racial memories, hypernormal sympathies, whatever you like to call them. I don’t see anything supernatural about it, just rather outside most people’s range of knowledge. The test of that is, that the local people treat the experiences they claim to have had as perfectly acceptable—almost take them for granted. They don’t go challenging them, they respect them, take what’s offered but don’t go probing any farther. A thoroughly healthy attitude, I call it. Look at Orrie,’ she appealed to her husband. ‘He’s seen the sentry twice. He doesn’t run away, or hang out crosses or wreaths of parsley, or ring up the local press, he merely mentions it to his friends in passing, and gets on with his work. And you couldn’t find anyone more down-to-earth than Orrie.’

‘Orrie?’ George enquired.

‘Our gardener. He’s local stock from way back. They had the same site, even bits of the same cottage, in the sixteenth century.’ She laughed suddenly, the evening’s first genuinely gay sound. ‘You wouldn’t credit what the Orrie’s short for! Orlando! Orlando Benyon! The name’s been in the family for generations, too.’

‘And Orrie’s seen the Roman sentry?’

‘Listen!’ she said, abruptly grave again. ‘I’ve seen him myself, or else hearing about it has put me in a special state of mind, and all the other factors have come up right, atmospheric conditions, combinations of light and dark, what you like, and made me create what I believed I was seeing. Twice! A figure in a bronze helmet, both times a good way off, and both times close to the standing walls. I didn’t find anything very strange in it, either. In its last years Aurae Phiala surely did mount a watch every night. Just such a sentry must have been the first to die, the night the Welsh came.’

Paviour’s uneasiness and distaste had grown so palpable by this time that his rigid bones looked tensed to breaking point. He said with nervous acidity: ‘We’re not dealing with atmospheric hallucinations here, but with an attempt at murder. When violence breaks in, something a good deal more material than imagination is indicated.’

She agreed, with an unabashed smile. ‘And when ordinary mundane light like a car’s headlights starts making the immaterial perceptible. Now that would be supernatural! I paint a bit for fun,’ she said, with a grimace of deprecation for the unsatisfactory results. ‘I do know about masses and light, even if I can never get them right. No, this person you saw was a pretty solid kind of reality.’

‘And he wasn’t wearing a helmet,’ said Gus.

‘Tonight’s haunting was for a pretty compelling reason,’ said George. ‘But what you’ve told us is very interesting, Mrs Paviour. We’ll see what the village has to add.’ He put down his coffee-cup in the tray with a sigh. ‘You’ve been very kind to put up with us all for so long, I’m most grateful. But now I think there’s nothing more we can do here, and it’s time we left you to get some rest. If you feel fit to go back to the inn, Mr Hambro, I’ll be glad to drive you and Miss Rossignol round there.’

Lesley had begun to gather up the remaining cups, but at the mention of Charlotte’s name she put down the tray abruptly, and turned with a startled smile. ‘Rossignol? You’re not Charlotte Rossignol? Steve, did you hear that? There can’t be two—not two and both connected with Roman antiquities! You must be the niece Doctor Morris mentioned. He told us once his sister’s girl had married a Frenchman.’

Charlotte admitted to her identity with some surprise. ‘I didn’t think he took so much interest in me. We’ve always been a rather loosely-knit family, and I’ve never seen him.’

‘It’s true he didn’t often talk about his family, but I couldn’t forget your lovely name, I liked it so much. You know Steve is an old fellow-student of his, and a close friend? Isn’t it wonderful, darling, Miss Rossignol turning up like this?’

His face was grey and drawn, Charlotte thought, perhaps with pure fatigue, for after all, he was an old man. He favoured her with a slightly haggard smile, but his voice was dry and laboured as he said: ‘I’m delighted to meet my old friend’s niece. I’m only sorry it had to be in such circumstances of stress. I hope you’ll give us the opportunity of getting to know you better, on some happier occasion.’ His lips were stiff, the words of goodwill could hardly get past them.

‘I’m not quite such a coincidence as I seem,’ she said, ‘I’ve just been reading my uncle’s book on Aurae Phiala, that’s why I came to have a look at the place for myself. He didn’t really do it justice, did he? I find it beautiful.’

‘Stephen doesn’t agree with him, either,’ said Lesley, smiling, ‘but of course Aurae Phiala is our life. Are you going to stay a little while, now you’re here? You should!’

‘I have a few concerts in the Midlands, and I thought I’d make my base somewhere close by until they’re over. Yes, I think I shall stay on for a few days here.’

‘But not at the “Salmon”! Oh, no, you can’t! Anyone belonging to Alan Morris has a home here, of course. You must come to us. Look at all the rooms we have, the house is much too big for two. Do come! Stay tonight, too, I can find you everything you need overnight, and we’ll fetch your things from the pub tomorrow.’

Confronted by sudden and eager invitations from strangers, Charlotte’s normal reaction was one of recoil, not out of insecurity, but to maintain her independence and integrity. She was never afterwards quite sure why she sidestepped only partially and temporarily on this occasion. There existed a whole tangle of possible reasons. She was in search of a closer knowledge of her great-uncle, and here were informed friends of his, one of them of long standing, who could surely tell her a great part of what she wanted to know. She was attracted by this place, and here was her opportunity of remaining. She was held by the disturbing events of the night, and here was her chance to wait out a better understanding of them on the spot. And also there was something in Lesley’s appeal that engaged her sympathy in a way she hesitated to analyse. Here was this young creature, beautiful and restless, married to a man almost old enough to be her grandfather, and apparently setting out to make the very best of it, too, with no signs of regret or self-pity; but the prospect of having a girl of her own age in the house, even for a few days, might well matter to her a great deal more than the extension and acceptance of a mere conventional politeness. And Charlotte heard herself saying quickly:

‘That’s awfully kind of you, and I should love to come for a couple of days, if I may. But I’d like to go back with Mr Hambro to the “Salmon” now, if you don’t mind. If I may come tomorrow?’

She had not looked at Paviour until then. Lesley had issued her fiat with such confidence that she had taken his compliance for granted. His long, lean, lugubrious face was dry and rigid as carved teak, and his eyes, sunken between veined lids and deep in cavernous hollows of bone, looked like roundels of cloudy glass with no light behind them. With all the grace and spontaneity of a wooden puppet, but in the most civil and soft of voices, he said: ‘We shall both be delighted if you will. We have the highest regard for Doctor Morris, and of course his niece is most welcome. And Lesley will enjoy your company so much,’ he added, and the sudden faint note of hope and warmth sounded almost as though he was issuing comfort to himself, looking on the single bright side. No doubt, she thought, a visitor might be a very unwelcome distraction in his entrenched life.

But it was done now, there was no way of backing out. And she need not, after all, stay long. After two days it would be easy enough to extricate herself.

During the short drive back to the inn they were all three monosyllabic, suddenly isolated in private cells of weariness and preoccupation. The occasional remark passing seemed to come from an infinite distance, and be answered after a prolonged interval.

‘I hope Mrs Lane won’t have locked you out. We should have given her a call.’

‘I’ve got a key,’ said Gus, and lapsed into silence again. He made no comment on Lesley’s invitation and Charlotte’s acceptance of it, none on the curious complexities which had confounded their own relationship since they left ‘The Salmon’s Return’ two hours and more ago. No one said a word about Doctor Alan Morris, and the charged significance of Charlotte’s name. There were things all three of them knew, and things all three of them were wondering, but no one cared to question or acknowledge at this hour. Silence, if not golden, was at least more comfortable than speech.

Only as the car was crunching softly to a halt in the gravel of the yard did Charlotte ask suddenly, but in a tone so subdued as to suggest that she had been contemplating the question for some time, and refrained from asking it only for fear of the answer:

‘You haven’t found him yet?’

The engine fell silent, and there was a brief and pregnant pause. Then: ‘No,’ said George Felse, equally carefully and constrainedly, ‘we haven’t found him.’

In the first chilly greyness of dawn, before the sun rose, Sergeant Comstock, of the uniformed branch, who came of a long line of native fishermen, not to say poachers, and knew his river as he knew the palm of his own hand, thankfully abandoned what he had always known was a useless patrol of the left bank downstream, and on his own responsibility borrowed one of his many nephews, and embarked with him in the coracle which was his natural means of personal transport on the Comer. They put out in this feather-light saucer of a boat from his nephew’s yard only just below the limits of Aurae Phiala, transport downstream in the spate being rapid and easy—for experts, at least—and the return journey much simpler by portage. This consideration had dictated his choice of nephew. Dick was the one he would really have preferred, but Dick lived well downstream. Jack was not only in the right spot, and the family coracle-builder, but a bachelor into the bargain, so that there was no protesting wife to contend with.

The sergeant had already mapped out in his own mind, with an eye to the wind, the speed of the flow and the amount of debris being brought down, the procession of spits, shoals, curves and pools where a heavy piece of flotsam would be likely to cast up, beginning immediately below the village of Moulden, which lay just below the Aurae Phiala enclosure. Cottages dotted the waterside through the village; and anything which had gone into the water some hours ago must, in any case, either have been brought ashore there already or long since have passed through, before the general alarm went out.

From there they went darting across the boiling surface like a dragon-fly, skimming with the currents where the banks were swept too open and smooth to hold flotsam, swinging aside round the sergeant’s paddle in the marked spots; round the shovel-shaped end of Eel Island, which had scooped up a full load of branches, twigs, uprooted grass, and even more curious trophies, but not what they were seeking; a little way down the sluggish backwater beyond, until motion ceased in stagnant shallows, and still there was nothing; out into the flood again, hopping back on to the current as on to a moving belt that whisked them away; revolving out of the race again where the trees leaned down into the water at the curve by the Lacey farm, acting like a great, living grille to filter out debris; clean across the width of the river at the next coil, to where the long, sandy shallow ran out and encircled a miniature beach. Every junk-heap of the Comer on this stretch they touched at and ransacked. It was a game they could win only by losing; every possibility checked and found empty was a point gained, and with every one discarded their spirits rose towards optimism.

The sun was up, and they were a mile or more downriver, in wider and less turgid reaches, where some of the best fishing pools deepened under the right bank.

‘Looks like we’ve had our trouble for nothing,’ Jack said, with appropriate satisfaction. ‘Anything that’s run that gauntlet without getting hooked has got to be brother to an eel.’

It was one more case of famous last words. In the first dark pool under the hollowed bank the steady, rolling eddies went placidly round and round, smooth as cream, their tension dimpling the centre into a slow, minor whirlpool. And in the middle of the slanting span, circling upon a radius of about three yards, and light enough to maintain its place a foot or so below the surface, something pale and oval went monotonously round and round. First oval and single, then weaving as it span, like a water-lily on a stem, then suddenly seen as articulate in separate petals, a limp magnolia flower.

‘Why don’t you keep your mouth shut?’ said Sergeant Comstock, with deep and bitter resignation, and reached for the boat-hook they’d brought with them. His third nephew Ted had made it to family specifications in his forge in the village of Moulden. ‘Cop hold of this paddle, and move us in slow. And hold us clear of him, or he’ll go down.’

There was a second drifting flower now, deep below, and greenish brown with the tint of the water between. And presently, as Jack held the paddle like a brake and let them in by inches, a third, without petals, a pale disc trailing tendrils of weed. A spreading darkness wove lazily beneath it, keeping it afloat.

The boat-hook reached overside gently, felt its way under the leaves of dark material, was lifted delicately into their folds, and held fast. The three submerged flowers lost their rhythm, jerked into stillness, and hung quivering. A palpable bulk aligned itself beneath them, a fish on a line, but a fish without fight.

‘I’ve got him,’ said Sergeant Comstock gruffly. ‘Better take us down a piece, where the bank levels out. We can get him ashore there.’

The fish floated uncomplainingly with them, down to the gentle slope of grass fifty yards downstream. There they brought the coracle ashore lightly, and drew in, with reluctance and the reverence of finality, what they had been hunting with such assiduity, and so persistently hoped they would not find. To have settled something is always an achievement and, of sorts, a satisfaction. This they would rather not have settled, and yet there was a kind of relief in it.

The body came ashore into the grass with monstrous and majestic indifference, for the first time caring nothing at all what impression it made. A long, young body in correct school uniform, black blazer, white shirt, black tie, dark grey slacks. Very like its living counterpart still, because it had not been in the river very long. The Comer had not managed to loosen the knot of the tie, though its ends floated wide, or to hoist off one of the regulation black shoes. He even had a ball-point pen still firmly clipped to the top of his breast pocket.

‘That’s him,’ said Sergeant Comstock, looking down at the slow rivulets of storm-water trickling down out of clothing and hair to wind their way thankfully through the grass back to the river. ‘Hang on here, Jackie, while I cut up to the farm and ’phone.’